Category Archives: cosplay

2023 Shoots, cosplay, natural light, Selfie Series

Catwoman at Fort Balance

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This is the second post on my shoot with Dawn at Fort Balance. It includes all the shots taken outside under natural light. This was after we finished the original Catwoman in the headlights mentioned in the previous place.

We moved around the complex which gave us many options to shoot. It also gave Dawn the opportunity to really play into her character.

For these series of images I was using my Nikon Z6ii camera with the 24-70 f4 lens set at f4. It was in aperture priority mode as I was happy to let the camera control the shutter speed. The majority of them seem to be around 1/200s second. Towards the end of the shoot, I did have to push the ISO up to 400. Even then the final images were at 1/50s.

Despite the fact that the fort is nearly a kilometre up a hill it is amazing what people take up there. We found this couch and I just had to use it.

The fort contains many different opportunities for shooting such as ladders that enable you to shoot down from above.

The Walls also gave the opportunity for Dawn to behave like a cat. Anyone who has seen the original Batman series will know that the Catwoman character did do overemphasised cat behaviour.

Anyone who has a cat will know that they like to find comfy nooks in which to sleep. I spotted an alcove complete with a cushion. It was a no-brainer that we were going to use it.  The lighting in this particular area was not the best but my camera easily handled it.

Dawn was a great model. She was really comfortable being in front of the Camera which made the whole process so much easier. It also meant that we got really great images from the session.

Finally when we got back to the car it was time for a selfie shot to add to the series

The 1960s when the original show screened was also the time of the rise of pop art.  Therefore I thought of appropriate to create a version of my own. This went across really well when I posted it.

2023 Shoots, Concept Images, cosplay, Lighting

Catwoman in the headlights

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My second shoot in the 2023 Wellington Cosplay Photo Fest was with Dawn.  

She was cosplaying Catwoman from the Batman series. Her costume was based on the original 1960’s television series. It was not based on the later movies. 

For the shoot we chose Fort Balance which is an old World War 2 gun emplacement on the Miramar Peninsula. It is a favourite location for shooting. It has many great areas with a never-changing array of street art.

I am splitting the shoot into two post as the lighting for each was quite different.

For the initial shoot I had a concept of Catwoman being caught in the headlights of a police car.  That meant that I wanted to have both blue and red lights illuminating the scene. Within the complex, there are a couple of rooms where there is next to no natural light. I knew they would be perfect for what I was wanting.

My camera was set at f8 1/200s and ISO100. This is my normal setting for studio work as it ensures full control of the light. Really given that I was in darkness anyway, I could have chosen different settings. But there is a little point in playing around when you know what works.

The original plan was to shoot using two speed lights at the same time. One would positioned camera left with a blue gel. The other would be positioned camera right covered with a red gel. This would have resulted in a wash of light.

The complex is on the top of the hill. It is just under a kilometre walk from where you can park the car. I decided not to carry all of the gear uphill. I chose what I thought I needed and left the remainder in the car. Unfortunately, when we went to set up the shoot, I realized the trigger for the second flash was in the car. It was not with us.

I decided not to waste time going back together. Instead, I repositioned the light. Then I took two shots, which I combined in Photoshop.  This is not that difficult to do although I would have preferred to have shot in the field. It did require Dawn to replicate poses. Fortunately she was able to do this.

Apart from the mess up with the missing equipment, this part of the shoot went well. I was really pleased with the finished image.

2023 Shoots, cosplay

Cosplay with Ann-Marie

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Each February there is a weekend event organised called the Wellington Cosplay Photo Fest.  Photographers and cosplayers from around New Zealand and Australia into the interest in attending the event a couple of months before. The organiser then matched photographers with cosplayers so that each photographer started off with two assignments. Once you have your allocation you arrange shoot times. You are also free to organise other shoots once you have completed your allocation. 

2023 was the fourth year that the event had run and that I had taken apart. The 2022 festival was one of many that ended up being cancelled due to Covid so people will really looking forward to the this year’s event.

As the event coincided with a really busy time for me I only elected to photograph the two cosplayers that I have been assigned. I booked both shoots for the same day. I also decided that I would choose locations fairly close to each other to minimise travelling.

My first shoot was with Ann-Marie who was cosplaying a character from Japanese anime. The Japanese anime seems to be very popular especially with female cosplayers.

For the shoot I wanted something dramatic as a background so we chose the Massey Memorial, which is at the southern tip of the Miramar Peninsula. This is actually the mausoleum of the former Prime Minister of New Zealand William Massey and his wife. It is constructed a white marble and is quite impressive.

We started with some basic shots of Ann-Marie with the city in the background before then moving to a more complicated set up that I had in mind. 

The rear of the memorial has a large curved wall with gaps in it.  I thought this would be great to use in a composite by shooting Ann-Marie separately in each of the gaps and then bringing it together. 

To achieve this the camera was placed on a tripod as this made merging the shots much easier later on. When we were shooting in daylight I wanted to have a pop obliged on Ann-Marie so I had a speed light in a small soft box.  Ann-Marie had brought a friend to the shoot to help her with her costume and so she ended up being my portable light stand. 

The images came out great and It was a simple matter of putting them into Photoshop and then using masking to create the image that I wanted. 

I started the shoot using Aperture Priority with setting between f6 and f6.3. For the composite image I used f10 as I needed a decent depth of field given the curve in the structure. After I shot this, the camera struggled to give me the desired exposure. I switched to manual mode and used flash to highlight Ann-Marie against the background. 

I shot from different angles so that the images did not look all the same. I had also shot sequences of Ann-Marie with the sword and so I created composite with these as well.

By chance while I was processing the images I came across a YouTube Club on how to create cartoons from images. Japanese anime started in comics I thought this was quite appropriate so I produced an image that she really liked.

2021 Shoots, cosplay, Location Shoots, Workshops

Behind the Lens: Shooting Chris as Stigpool

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I met Chris at the very first Wellington Cosplay Photofest where he came in an stormtrooper outfit from Star Wars. You can read about that shoot here.

In May 2021 I organised a location shoot for my camera club at the World War 2 gun emplacements at Fort Balance on the Miramar Peninsula. I reached out to Chris and he came along in his own creation Stigpool. This is a combination of the Stig character from the Top Gear television series and Deadpool.

Chris had a fully kitted car to go along with his character so we started at the roadside with some shots there. These were all shot under natural light 1/200s at f8.

Then we moved up into the bunkers in shoot at several locations initially outside.

We then moved inside the complex and I positioned Chris and let him with a speed light in a small soft box on a light stand to the side. Positioning of this light was very important to avoid reflection within his visor. For the inside shots the settings were 1/125s f7.1 ISO 200.

The words on the floor were a complete coincidence but they worked in so well with the character.

For the final shot I had Chris climbing through a hole in the wall. The main light was again positioned to the side with a small speedlight in the room behind him to provide separation.

Shooting a character in a full face helmet is quite tricky as you cannot rely on the eye detect that modern mirrorless cameras. Fortunately my Lumix G9 switches to head and body detection when it cannot lock onto the eye.

It was a fun day and everybody seemed to enjoy themselves.

2021 Shoots, cosplay

Wellington Cosplay Photofest – Bianca

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My final shoot at 2021 Wellington Cosplay Photofest was with Bianca who goes by @Happy_Cookie-Snapper. She had a number of possible costumes and we agreed that she would play Toshiro Hitsugaya from the Japanese anime series bleach. Given that anime cosplay allows people to be completely different characters it is not unusual to find them portraying characters of the opposite sex.

During our discussions we settled all the shit in Wellington Civic Square and the entrance to the Michael Fowler Centre as we could make these resemble the environment of Bleach. She she mentioned that to her her friends were also taking part in the car fest and they were playing characters from the same series and as such could we shoot it as a group. I was more than happy to do so.

After the incident of the armed police call out at a previous Photofest I was taking no chances that somebody would report us as the characters were carrying samurai swords. I called the police ahead of time and told them that we were doing a photoshoot. As the event ran over a long weekend I knew that the square would not be as busy as it would normally be on day.

When they arrived it turned out that the other two where Jasmine and Ruan had shot a couple years before at the very first Photofest. We shot around the top of the square and then moved down to the entrance of the centre.

Most of the shoot was done in natural light, however for the ones outside the centre I did position a speedlight behind to columns to ensure that the back two characters stood out.

Once I had selected the final images I used Nik Software to create a heavier contrast before delivering them.

I was very pleased when Bianca told me that they had ended up looking exactly how she had imagined and that they fitted the bleach world well.

2021 Shoots, cosplay, natural light

Wellington Cosplay Photofest – Natasha

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My second shoot at the 2020 Wellington Cosplay Photofest was with Natasha .

What was unusual about this shoot in terms of cosplay is that most cosplayers recreate characters from either movies, games or cartoons particularly Japanese anime. Natasha had created her own character that she called Rainella the clown.

This means that there was no reference in which to place the character giving us total freedom. We decided that the Lady Norwood Rose Garden and Begonia House in the botanical Gardens would be an ideal location. All of the images were shot under natural light at f7.1.

As the Begonia House is a large greenhouse there was no need to add in additional lighting.

As you can imagine Natasha’s outfit attracted a lot of attention particularly from children.

2021 Shoots, cosplay

Wellington Cosplay Photofest – Nikki

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Each year in February there is a cosplay event organised in Wellington that brings together both cosplayers and photographers who collaborate on a completely TFP basis.

It started in 2019 and I was fortunate to be selected in that year and the two following ones. The images in this and the next two posts were taken at the 2020 event.

The way that the event works is that you are matched with a number of cosplayers and you then sort out a shoot time and location over the course of the weekend. Some of the more experienced cosplayers have multiple costumes so there is often variety available.

My first shoot in the 2021 event was with Nikki who goes by the Instagram name @chameleon.costume and we decided to shoot her dressed as Leyleth from Vox machina which she explained to me was a dungeons and dragons fantasy series.

The costume screamed nature so we set up to shoot in the redwood trees that form part of the Wellington city belt on Mount Victoria.

It would have been nice to shoot in golden hour but the timing did not allow for that plus the cloned on the day made it impossible anyway. So I used my usual cheat of a speed light with an orange gell.

I had also packed my lensbaby so I brought that out to play as well.

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Cosplay at the R-Bar

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In some ways the final shoot of the 2020 Wellington Cosplay Photofest was the one I was looking for the most. The R-Bar is located in Cuba Street and is a pirate themed bar. Until last year I didn’t even know it existed when it was used for the social of the 2019 PhotoFest.

I spoke to the manager on the night and have wanted to get back and shoot there again ever since. So this year, when the opportunity presented itself to book slots over the weekend I jumped at it.

After the fourth cosplayer I was supposed to shoot pulled out I was assigned Tamara, and by that stage the location was booked. Tamara is a professional costume designer and one of her outfits fitted the location perfectly.

Lighting in the bar is fairly low and I wanted to insure that the ambient came through in the images. The achieve this I told Tamara that I would be shooting with long exposures so she needed to hold her poses. She did this perfectly. The strobes were set to fire at the end of the exposure.

This mixed lighting meant that you could meter for it and all shots were based on trial and error and seeing what looked good in the back of the camera.

I really enjoyed the time there and could see it used in future shoots.

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Beauregard cosplay

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The third shoot in the 2020 Wellington Cosplay Photofest was with Gabriela who was wearing a Beauregard costume. In our initial discussions she has asked for a nature environment so we chose to shoot in Trelissick Park in Ngaio. The park has a stream running through it as well as bush. In addition it has some old ruins of ammunition stores that have a very castle like setting.

When we got to the park we discovered another group at the ruins so we started with the stream. The day had stared overcast but by the time of the shoot it was brilliant blue skies and strong sun. Personally those are my least favourite conditions.

Along the path I found an interesting spot with gnarled roots so Gabriela climbed up and positioned herself there. I had brought the Godox AD600 light with me along with the 26inch softbox. Gabriela had asked if she could bring a friend and he ended up holding the light that I had mounted on an extended monopod.

By the time we had finished in this area the other groups had completed their shoot at the ruins so we ended the shoot with some images there.

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cosplay at the bunker

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The second shoot in the 2020 Wellington Cosplay Photofest was with Pohutukaryl Cosplay who was dressed as Chloe Frazer from Uncharted, a character from an action game. The moment that she mentioned street fighter to me I knew that we would be going back to the gun emplacement on Palmer Head.

I have shot at this location a number of times and it is a very popular spot so you never know how many people you will run into there. When we arrived there was a group of girls taking selfies on the roof, and when we went inside we disturbed a couple in an intimate act.

We shot all over the complex to create different angles and looks. For the inside images lighting was provided with my Godox speed light in a small softbox as this was very portable.

We were probably at the site for about a hour before we decided to pack up and head home. We were literally only 50 meters from the bunker to meet up with four very heavily armed police officers. Someone had reported seeing someone with a gun and they were taking no chances. Given that no one saw us with the toy pistol my assumption was that they had mistaken my light stand. That was what the cop thought as well and we were all on our way.